Happily ever after

Cinderella, Snow white and seven dwarfs, Sleeping beauty, Beauty and the Best
All ends with
".. and they lived happily ever after.."

When I was young.
Reading those books made me feel good.
At the very last page, when they have conquered all odds to be together with their prince charming to live happily ever after made me smile.

But like the story itself, happily ever after is just fairytale.
A long drawn tale about 2, falling in love and overcoming all odds to be together, in love living happily ever after.
Which part of the tale makes the fairytale a fairytale?
The process where they meet, fall in love and overcome obstacles?
Or
The happily ever after.

The most fairytale-ish part of fairytales (to me) is the happily ever after.
Which relationship does not involve 2 parties overcoming all odds?
Which relationship does not involve 2 parties falling in lvoe
Which relationship ends in a happily ever after?

When I grew a little older.
I've learnt to be skeptical.
I remembering asking once.
So when Snow white and the prince kissed and went on to live happily ever after, are they really really happy?
You mean they do not quarrel or bicker about the way they should run the kingdom, or when deciding on the colors of the curtains?

In fairytales, happily ever after spells the end of the story. It signifies a closure to the story. But I never believed in things stopping as that.
I always asked myself.
So what happens after that? When they are back in their castle. Do they have children, do they yell at each other, do they continue to overcome the evils and obstacles in life?
Things are just not that simple isn't it?

Define your happily ever after.
What does it look like?
Though I believe it does not exist, still everybody has their own mental image of how happily ever after looks like.
Mine, I just want to be happy.
I don't know, I don't know what it takes to make me happy. But I just want to be happy 24/7/365.
Didn't I just say, that it does not exist?

And so, with that I begin to wonder.
How do you decide who to settle down with, to live happily ever after.
Once again, the above said fairytales are just nothing but fairytales.
So when the prince comes along to kiss Sleeping Beauty and wake her from her eternal sleep, she decides there and then, that her prince is the one?
No conflicting personalities?
No abusive streak in Prince?
No body odour?
No perverted fantasies?
No human weakness?

So she jsut wakes and decides this life-saving prince is The One.
How I wish my life is as simple as that.
Some prince comes along, kisses me, and that is that.
I have absolute faith that thereafter, we'll live happily ever after.
But no.
Life is and never will be as simple as that.
You go through life in reality.

How do you decide.
How would you know when and who is the right person to settle down with, when nothing in life is permanent.
When everything changes, even you.
So how does one believe.

I look at my parents and often wonder.
So how'd they know they are right for each other.
How'd they know they can live life together in harmony and love till death do they part?
How?
I can love one today.
But even I am not certain anymore, that the one I love today wil be the one I love in say 20 years time.
Maybe my love is just not too strong.

Or maybe, I am just too skeptical.

Happily ever after.
I may be no princess.
But I still want a happily ever after.
Can?